


Not Forsaken

by aurumdalseni (kyo_chan)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Catharsis, Fix-It, M/M, Season 7 Spoilers, VLD spoilers, but that wasn't the point, it can be sheith if you squint, season 7, this is a Shiro fic above being a sheith fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-27 13:46:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15686631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyo_chan/pseuds/aurumdalseni
Summary: Shiro teeters on the brink of wondering if everything will be okay or if he's losing everything he loves. There is one who knows him well enough to comfort him. It's the Black Lion.





	Not Forsaken

**Author's Note:**

> I have needed to write this ever since season 7 dropped. It's something that I've felt strongly about for quite some time now. I hope you enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing it. <3 Thank you for being here.

At first, Shiro doesn’t want to believe it’s happening. The call comes in the middle of the night, and it has the feel of starlight. He’d dozed off, and now raising his head feels like a monumental task. He has to admit to himself how fleeting sleep has been for him, but he stubbornly denies needing more, no matter what his body tries to tell him. Somewhere in the back of his mind is something he understands without needing words. It’s admonishing, nearly scolding, but with the gentleness of a vast and endless patience. He knows this. Shiro bolts out of his chair and hurries out of his office.

He comes back to himself, blinking as he descends down the hangar lift — lights, shadow, lights, shadow. Shiro tries to ask himself where he’s going, but he already knows the answer. The deviously color-coded panel of available floors is indicative of his destination. The purple button glows faintly, and he clenches his fists at his sides. This is just his imagination. This is stress. This is…

The Black Lion.

Shiro glances around himself first, muscle memory of one foot in front of the other lost to some gap of time he doesn’t remember between the soft halo of purple light in the lift and now. His breath is frozen in his lungs. He’s missed her so much, but none of this makes sense. Maybe he’s still dreaming, back in his office where he last remembers being with solid clarity. The Black Lion’s head is lowered so that her chin is on the ground, as if she’s been expecting him. But Shiro knows that shouldn’t be.

“Why am I here?” he asks, and his voice bounces back to him off the walls of the hangar.

His response is Black opening her jaws to him, and while she doesn’t roar, he can feel her metallic hum-purr like a living thing between his ribs. It’s suddenly easier to breathe.

Shiro sits down in the cockpit and his chest tightens again. “I don’t belong here,” he tells her. “You know that.” He reaches for the thrusters.

They take flight. The path is different through the bay doors of the IGF-Atlas, and he tries one last time to reason with the Black Lion first, then Atlas, as if she couldn’t condone this type of misbehavior. Neither of them listen to him, and he supposes he should be used to that. The ships have always known he’s theirs.

Together, they leave Earth behind. Shiro is scared, but in the kind of way that expresses he trusts Black implicitly with his life, but that he doesn’t know what’s ahead. All around him, her uniquely oppressive and freeing presence cloaks him. His grip eases on the thrusters and his hands fall into his lap. Shiro closes his eyes as they drift further into the stars. It isn’t long before the stars he called home for an unquantifiable time welcome him back once more, and any fear he could muster up is once more soothed by the Black Lion’s consciousness. _**Trust**_ , she whispers.

_I do_ , he answers.

_**I did not forsake you**_.

A sob wrenches itself out of Shiro’s throat before he can stop it. His left hand claps over his mouth, the other grips the arm rest so hard metal grinds against metal. He can feel tears on his face, hot and unforgiving, breaking through the iron gate of responsibility and pride to leave him once more vulnerable to the Lion. He doesn’t dare call her _his_ anymore. He has no right to—

_**You are wrong.**_ The words are delivered one by one. He is not of her anymore, nor should he be, so she needs to speak in a way he understands. It takes a moment, and she tries again. _**Of all my paladins, you have always had the right. And I would have you as my Paladin again.**_

That should be enough. Just knowing that she hasn’t abandoned him for some thing he’s done wrong — a thing he’s been trying to figure out since waking up on the journey home. He had gone through so many possibilities, from being Champion to being dead to being in a different body, the body of someone who had tried to destroy everything. Things that had not been his fault, but he lived them and experienced them as if they were, and he hasn’t been able to shake that fear in the silence their missing bond had left behind. It should be enough for her to go out of her way to bring him back to the stars and tell him he is still beloved. But as the tears keep coming, he’s still Shiro, he still has to _know_.

_Why?_

_**Many reasons. I have learned from you.** _

_From_ _…me?_

_**It is difficult to accept when change must occur. You fear, you hold tight with your claws and your teeth and your might, and sometimes, you do not know when you have rent that which you love to shreds before you learn to let go. I wish to protect you. To have two Paladins was a mistake. I destroyed both. I will not make that mistake again.** _

Shiro gasps. The sound of his own breath whispers past him numerous times while a horrifying thought latches on. A rapid-fire memory of Keith’s blood on the Black Lion’s controls, all the medics and machines. He hasn’t woken up. Shiro can’t breathe. _Keith_ _…!_

_**Do not panic. My bond with the future sleeps with him until he is ready. That is how you can be here. But our time is short.** _

Despite her reassurance, Shiro still can’t take in enough air. It’s unnecessary in this place, and he knows it, but after becoming corporeal once more, he doesn’t want to be without it. His heart races, he buries his face in his hands and cries out all his fears. Black is infinitely patient, she always has been with him. He trusts her to protect this moment to acknowledge how much it would have broken him if the paladins hadn’t survived. If Keith hadn’t survived.

When the worst of it is over, he reaches, he can feel his hands close around her thrusters once more. _I miss this_ , he admits in a whisper. _I miss you_.

_**And I you. But he is yours, and so am I. A silent place does not always mean solitude, nor does one exist tangled in the weave of the Universe without seeing those threads in every star. You will always be mine, and our time to fly together is not done. I promise.** _

Shiro can feel it, the pull of the stars as they drift back. He knows they are returning, but he doesn’t feel her land. A smile is on his face before he even opens his eyes. This is familiar to him as well. He’s back in the Black Lion’s hangar within the Atlas. They’d gone so far and yet nowhere, and he’s reminded of how much that means to him, knowing it’s just as important to her.

_Thank you_.

Walking back to the lift, Shiro tries to reach out for her once more and doesn’t find her. But he knows she’s there, and it’s the first time he’s been certain of that since he’d been pulled from her stars.

Shiro doesn’t go back to his office, instead heading for the medical wing, where the paladins are all recovering. He checks on each and every one of them, all asleep, some with their family members and loved ones hovering close. Some are still awake and salute him as they see him in the observation window. He salutes back.

Krolia cracks an eye open as he steps as quietly as possible into Keith’s room. He raises his eyebrow in an unspoken question, and she shakes her head. The crease of her brows in concern for her son make Shiro’s heart ache, but he can’t help smile at her, nodding once. If anyone would know Keith will pull through, it is the Black Lion.

_**Trust** _ _._

_I do._

Krolia’s expression is dubious, but she adjusts the press of her shoulders into the wall once more to try and sleep.

Shiro takes his seat at Keith’s bedside and wraps his hand up in his fingers, careful not to jostle the IV. _I_ _’m here_ , he tells Keith without saying a word, hoping that the message will be delivered. Keith’s hand twitches in his own, and Shiro smiles.

It’s going to be all right.

_**I did not forsake you.** _

**Author's Note:**

> Come and talk to me about VLD over on my [tumblr](http://paladinpuppypile.tumblr.com)!


End file.
